Weezer to Release ‘Black Album’ in 2018

Last Friday, Weezer released their 11th album, Pacific Daydream, and they're already thinking about the follow-up. Frontman Rivers Cuomo has revealed that The Black Album could arrive as soon as May 2018.

The latest LP wasn’t part of the band’s plan, which was for 2016’s The White Album to be followed by The Black Album. But Pacific Daydream ended up being written first. “It inserted itself in front of The Black Album,” Cuomo told Dazed. “The Black Album is almost done, and hopefully it comes out in May, but this one got finished first and it’s good, so we brought it out.

“I like putting out music and I don’t like waiting around," he continued. "I think I want to pick up the pace, actually. The slow part is finding the right producer, because that kind of locks you into a certain production sound and that’s a contentious part. Everyone has their idea of what Weezer should sound like. But the songwriting part is fun and easier.”

He agreed that The White Album and Pacific Daydream both had a sound inspired by California and Mexico, and explained that their 12th title would feel different. “When I was a teenager I was just doing heavy metal and I was on the other side of the country,” he said. “New England is very cold and snowy and miserable. But as soon as I moved to California my whole style changed and I started writing not metal but music, basically. I give a lot of credit to that particular spot on Earth. It just brings out this really nice side of me creatively, and I still live there so I guess that’s why I’m still doing it. That being said, the next album is not going to be that at all. Because I’m sick of doing it, I want to do something different. I think [The Black Album] is going to be a lot more modern and electronic and not ‘90s sounding.”

As you wait for The Black Album, check out the stream of Pacific Daydream in the Spotify widget below.